Maria Monaci Gallenga
Painter and designer of textiles and clothes. Her fame is linked to the invention of a technique for printing textiles with which she made clothes and furnishings that were very famous in Europe and the U.S. between 1915 and 1935.
Born in Rome to one of the most cultivated families of the time, she grew up surrounded by scholars, poets, philosophers, and scientists. In 1903, she married Pietro Gallenga, one of the first doctors to specialize in oncology.
She began to paint while still very young, fascinated by Renaissance painting. Fabrics depicted by the painters she loved, combined with her admiration for the work of Mariano Fortuny, stirred her interest in the textile arts and directed her artistic choices.
Starting in 1915, there are records of her participation in important exhibits such as the Roman Secession, in which she presented panels and cushions printed in velvet, and the San Francisco Exhibition, in which she presented clothes that she designed and printed. She enjoyed great success at each.
The early models and the first printing proofs recall, in their shape and choice of themes, those of Fortuny. But the artistic criteria that were the basis for her international success soon proved to be totally original.
Sensitive and engaged in the cultural debates of her time, which asked questions about the role of the decorative arts, the search for a style that was at the same time both modern and national, and the qualities which distinguish an art product, an artisanal product, and a product of small industry from one other.
She provided concrete answers which she pursued with intelligence and awareness. In the garment, which had in itself, as something that was used, the concreteness of life, she saw the possibility of a synthesis between the pictorial arts (in the decorations) and the plastic arts (in the cut of the tailoring).
The garment represented, moreover, the most eloquent way to spread the new aesthetic ideas. Such an ambitious program could not be followed all on her own. Gallenga always worked in collaboration with the most famous artists of her time, who provided the patterns for her printed fabrics.
The collaboration with Vittorio Zecchin was already in place by the time of the San Francisco Exhibition of 1915, and it was renewed for the exhibitions of Amsterdam in 1922 and Paris in 1925. She worked with Antonio Maraini for the Venice Bienniale in 1924. The sketches for the curtain she created for the Quirino Theater in Rome in 1925 were made by Marcello Piacentini. Her partnerships with artists also saw collaborations with Galileo Chini, Gino Sensani, Romano Romanelli, Carlo and Fides Testi, and Emanuele Cito di Filomarino. She participated with them on the programs of the National Institute for Artisanal Crafts and Light Industry established in 1925 to spread and strengthen the image of Italian products.
She was awarded the silver medal at the Monza exhibition in 1923. In 1928, together with the other women entrepreneurs Bice Pittoni and Carla Visconti di Modrone, she opened the Boutique Italienne in Paris. Located on Rue Miromesnil, it was active until 1934 as a window on modern Italian taste.
Apart from her first models, which remind one of Fortuny, Gallenga's clothes took current fashion trends into account. The recognition of her role was also confirmed by the French, who admired her pavilion at the Expo of 1925 and invited her, the only one in Italy, to participate in a high fashion presentation organized at the Lido in Venice by the magazine Fémina.
Every garment, every interior décor object that she produced was unique: even though the style might be repeated, the fabric and the pattern were always different. The printing of the textiles was always carried out by hand with wooden blocks on the pieces of fabric before the garment was manufactured, so that the pattern could be adjusted to the shape and cut of the material. It was sometimes also done on partially finished pieces, so that the patterns would not print on the seams. The large patterns were sectioned off and composed of several moulds, obtaining ever changing compositions. This printing technique, which she patented, involved the use of metallic pigments, mostly gold and silver. Very typical was the technique of shading one color into another, producing a shadow effect.
The fabrics used most were velvet and crepes of different weight, such as chiffon, georgette, and marocain. The patterns chosen were inspired by publications on art fabrics which had started to appear in those years, with a clear preference for fabrics made in Lucca in the 1300s. Starting in the mid 1920s, the modern artists in the group linked to her became dominant.
Through the manufacture of these kinds of garments, Gallenga meant to answer the problem of how to create a style of fashion according to Italian taste that wouldn't be just an artistic product but could also, without losing its artistic content, pay attention to the necessities of production and marketing.
Printing by hand, as reinvented by her, guaranteed aesthetic quality in the design, and, due to its rather fast execution, allowed pieces to be produced in multiples but without any decline in quality due to repetition. This opened new commercial horizons and transformed the artist into a manufacturing artisan. The patent and 7,000 wooden moulds, some hand carved and some drilled, now belong to the Collection of the theatrical tailor Umberto Tirelli.
